


Fledgling Hunter

by EighthOfHisName



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types, Hannibal Lecter Tetralogy - Thomas Harris
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-06-25 15:27:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19748539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EighthOfHisName/pseuds/EighthOfHisName
Summary: Clarice is adjusting to life under Jack Crawford's wing. It isn't as safe as she'd thought it would be.





	Fledgling Hunter

Stafford county was about a half hour away, given the traffic provided on a Friday evening. Clarice Starling could have used the range at the Academy; the ammo was free for the students to train with, as were the firearms. She didn't want to chance a run-in with someone she knew, though. Not today. Not right now. 

The range out towards Stafford was outdoors, which was a pleasant change to the sterility and formality of Quantico. They were breaching the beginning of crisper September nights in Virginia; the cool air soothed her mottled skin. Anger had always brought an unpleasant flush to Clarice’s face; she'd sell her right arm if it meant getting rid of it. No one all the way out in the sticks knew her, though; she wasn't the most promising new recruit of the Academy, she wasn't Jack's little “pet project”. She was just a kid with a gun who, to all of the other patrons, was a jarringly good shot. 

“Your husband teach you how to shoot like that, Girlie?” The man asked, leaning into the shelf of her lane. He was older; too old and too out of shape to be looking at her the way he was. She locked her jaw and stared forward, breathing in slowly through her nose. 

“Shy, huh?... Used to handlin’ pistols, I see. Like that in a woman. You plans for after you're done goofin' off here?”

The safety was clicked into place and her Walther hit the counter with a blunt clack. Deep brown eyes burrowed into him, unyielding, dangerously inquisitive. Her voice was accidental music through a windchime, a sharp contrast to the medium of her words.

**“The wedding band left an indention on your finger; it just came off, didn't it? A damn shame for your wife. Wilma, right? It's her name on the licensing papers for your pistol, which you've left out here, and… Judging by the way you're fumblin’ around, trying to hide that pathetic tent you've pitched, I bet you can't work either of those assets properly. Poor girl really got the short end of the stick, didn't she?”**

Her gloves needed tightening. Starling unfastened and re-secured them, piercing gaze back on her paper target. 

**“Not smart to fuck with someone with decent shot and a bad attitude, is it, Mr. Polich? I’m sure all your employees back at your hole-in-the-wall plumbing joint would laugh if they found out a “little lady” knocked your ass out.”** She motioned a finger towards the name patch on his shirt, which peeked from behind his jacket.  **“Go on, then. I’m busy.”**

“COLD RANGE!”

Before the man could speak another word to her she started off into the field to go collect her target. No specialty rounds were allowed here; each pock in the paper was precise and small. She thumbed over the holes, criticizing her form. 

_ “Bang, you're dead. Why are you dead, Starling?” _

**_“Because I didn't check my corners.”_ **

_ “You didn't check your corners. Expected more from you, considering Crawford's glowing praise. Clean your shit up or I'll fail you and the rest of your team.” _

Fingernails worried at the material as she remembered the conversation she had with her instructor earlier, causing a rip between two of the entry tears on her paper man - straight from the sternum to the heart. Flayed open now, leaving his innards out for everyone to see. 

The image was familiar to her. It pricked harshly behind her eyes. 

Another paper man was clipped into place and she returned to her firearm, shoulders squared and tense. Don't think about it. Save that anger for later. Breathe deep, remember the good times.

She couldn't.

_ “Your daddy will wake up real soon, Reece. I've been doctorin’ for thirty years now, ain't nothin’ gonna stop me from gettin’ him home safe and sound to you.” _

Clarice should have been picturing the men that had murdered Charles Starling behind that gas station in 1995. She had memorized their faces, their birthdays, their testimonies, how stupid they had looked in court wearing their cheap ties and stinking of their Granddad's shitty pomade. But it wasn't them on her mind when she unloaded the chamber.

It was the doctor. 

Three shots to the head, four to the chest. One to the groin. Four rounds left.

To make such a promise to a little girl was beyond cruel, it was… Inhuman. Animalistic. Her father had been doomed from the second he had caught those teenagers by surprise. Only a coward would give a little girl false hope. And when she had been left alone, it wasn't him that told her she was orphaned. It was his nurse. He went home early to eat dinner with his family. 

One more round, right through the neck. 

Her nightmares bled into her reality more and more these days; she slept very little and her dreams were so heavy, dense. They had to come out somewhere. She was always in that Goddamn barn, watching her uncle take those lambs apart, piece by piece. Wasn't good to let the meat sit, he had said; cut it up before the fear gets to all the muscle. Only recently had his chopping block been filled with more than lambs. Some nights Crawford kneeled there, other nights it was her father's murderers. Every other night it was Clarice herself. Those were the most bearable. 

Tonight it would be the teacher who had belittled her in front of all of her peers. He'd scream and get taken apart, bit by bit.

The rest of the chamber was emptied into her shaking palm and she huffed out a trembling sigh, realizing very quickly that she had lost track of herself again. Lack of sleep, she figured. That was what she had been chalking it up to for the last month. She rolled the two bullets about in her hand, attention locked on them like a snake it a bird's nest.

**_“Always collectin’ little shiny things to take home, aren't you Sunshine? My greedy little magpie. You won't have enough spots in your room if you keep bringin’ stuff back home to stash away!”_ **

She could hear her daddy's voice as clear as day as the memory rolled in. She returned to it often; that smile he only smiled sometimes - just wide enough to show off the crooked canine he had, the way the creek bubbled along beside them, the sound of crickets singing as the evening rolled in. He had plucked it from her little hand and looked it over through narrowed eyes. 

**_“You found a little piece of quartz. That's real special, Clarice. Good find!”_ **

Her cellphone vibrated in her pocket and she answered it quickly, clearing her throat. 

**“Hello, Mr. Crawford… Yeah, yes, now's a fine time.”**

Her gun was holstered by trembling fingers. Tears were hot against her wind-bitten cheeks. 

**“What can I do for you, Sir?”**


End file.
